Dragon Village M Wiki:Manual of Style
This page outlines the style in which all pages on the Dragon Village M Wiki should be formatted and written in. The aim is to create consistency across the wiki, as well as within articles, and to help create and maintain a high standard for article pages on this wiki. Overview *In general, the Dragon Village M Wiki uses the writing conventions and formatting found in the Wikipedia:Manual of Style. *This page summarizes the most important aspects of Wikipedia's manual, with changes as it applies to this site. As such, this page should be used as the main source of reference regarding formatting on the Dragon Village M Wiki. *The rules outlined on this page apply only to article pages, and do not apply to comments or discussion. *While site wide consistency is ideal, as a general rule, consistency in formatting and style within an article is considered more important. Writing Conventions General rules *Writings in pages should be clear and concise. Use plain English as much as possible; avoid jargon and complex wordings. **American English will be used on this site, as that is what is used in Dragon Village M. *Use full sentences and punctuation, avoid slang and emoticons. *Present tense should be used, except when referring to past events. Grammar *Follow conventional English use of apostrophes when using possessives. Remember, "its" has no apostrophe. *Write articles in the third person whenever possible. Please avoid second person pronouns (you, your) to prevent ambiguity, although they may be used in guide pages if needed. **Because articles are not opinion pieces, never write in first person (don't use "I", "my", "us", "our" and "we"). *When quoting, please try to preserve the quote as much as possible, including spelling and grammar. If a significant error exists, place sic beside the error. Only change a quote if it cannot be understood unless corrected. **Avoid linking in quotes. Vocabulary *Avoid contractions as much as possible. *Gender neutral language is preferred. **The exception to this would be contexts in which only one gender is present. *Avoid presumptuous language. Words such as "obviously" and "clearly" should not be used. Abbreviations *Before using an abbreviation, introduce the full terminology first, followed by the abbreviation in brackets. **For example, use "Relationship Dungeons (RD)" first. "RD" can then be used later throughout the article. Linking *Links to other pages should be made only on its first appearance. Subsequent appearance need not be linked. *Links should be made when they can help explain the article more or when the links go into more detail. **e.g. Dungeon links to Relationship Dungeon, and the Relationship Dungeon page will contains detailed information. Unique Wiki Conventions *Dragon grades should be typed in the format of "Number-Star". **For example, a 3-Star Lambgon, a 4-Star Clown Dragon, a 5-Star Arkana. **Actual number of stars are only used in Dragon Pages. Miscellaneous *If something does not apply to a field, use "N/A". **For example, use "N/A" in the cooldown and range fields for dragon leader skills. *If the data for something is unknown, use a question mark "?". Formatting Article titles *Article titles should be concise, should accurately describe what the page is about, and should be consistent with other articles with similar topics. *Do not over capitalize. Only the first letter of the first word should be capitalized, except when dealing with names or terms. *Avoid abbreviations, except when the subject is known exclusively as an acronym. *Don't use quotation marks. Section Organization *Articles should begin with a lead introductory paragraph without any headings. Each subsequent section should have a header. Exceptions include dragon pages, which do not contain a lead paragraph. **For full guidelines on writing a lead section, see the Lead section part of Wikipedia's manual of style. Section headings *Do not refer redundantly to the subject of the article. (i.e. Do not repeat the article title again) *Do not use links. *Headings should be unique within a page. *Do not use images or icons. *Do not include questions. Boldface *Use boldface to highlight article titles used in the lead section. *Table headers and captions should also be in bold. *Avoid boldface for most other instances, including emphasis. Instead, use Italics. Italics *In general, italics should be used when names are present in articles. *Names of works of art should be italicized such as: **Books **Movies **Video games **Television shows **Musicals **Music albums *Italics can also be used for emphasis, such as drawing attention to important words or phrases. Numbers *Numbers from one to nine should be written as words. *Numbers greater than nine, and consisting of two or more words should be written as numbers. **e.g. 20,000 not "twenty thousand". *Numbers greater than nine, and consisting of only one word can be written as words or numbers. **e.g. 12 can be written as "twelve" or "12" *Commas should be used to delimit numbers with five or more digits (e.g. 34,000). Numbers with four digits are at the editor's discretion, but be consistent. Miscellaneous *When making invisible comments on article pages, enclose the text you intend to be read only by editors between . For example: . **Information on invisible comments can be found here.